Another Q6600! After the clock...

Scumball · 24 Nov 2007 at 13:32

Hi folks, quick bit of background:

P5K-E Wifi/AP on BIOS 0602 (0806 is ****)
Q6600 G0
Corsair 8500C5 Dominator
Zalman 9700
Thermaltake Tsunami (I know! lol)

Have clocked the above to 3420 @ 1.3v, temps are about 58c on load with the zalman on low, very happy with the clock. (380x9)

Question is regarding the RAM... Currently on a 3:2 divider @ 1170mhz, using stock voltage and 5-5-5-15 timings. The whole thing is super stable under Prime all day.

When I Sandra'd the Memory bandwidth as a comparison I'm only scoring about 7700, when Sandra has standard P35 + 2GB of 8500 RAM down as about 11000.

I tried tighter timings at 760mhz, 4-4-4-12 with lower volts and it was still stable but even slower.

How can I best configure my (perhaps unnecessarily expensive and high-spec but beautiful and braggable) RAM to get the best out of my system?

Gained 2000 3dMark06 points with a clock and a driver update... But now I need more.

Cheers in advance!

Scumball · 25 Nov 2007 at 10:30

Just bumping this, really don't quite understand RAM speeds/bandwidth, so any advice you can offer would be appreciated.

schumi84 · 25 Nov 2007 at 10:56

When you're running the benchmark, do you have anything else running in the background that could be hampering the result?

Scumball · 25 Nov 2007 at 11:04

Well, Vista x64! Some of the processes use a bit of resident memory, but nothing actively utilising the RAM.

schumi84 · 25 Nov 2007 at 11:11

Hmmm, i have not had the pleasure of using Vista yet. The difference in score could be down to Vista.
Would need a second opinion on this just to see whether this is the reason.

WJA96 · 25 Nov 2007 at 11:21

There is a fixation on the first 4 numbers, but actually you do need to tune all the numbers, which means you do have to understand what they all mean, and, in very simple terms, how RAM works.

Try this for an explanation.

Be especially aware of the slowdown caused by having 4 sticks of RAM rather than 2 and the fact that the SPD timings the manufacturers pre-program are notoriously poor to ensure compatability with as many other components as possible.

Also look out for the 1T vs. 2T issue now that Intel have woken up to the performance implications of that timing feature on the P35 chipset.